BEIRUT -- Syrian government warplanes pounded an Islamic State group stronghold as well as other towns controlled by the jihadis Sunday, conducting more than a dozen airstrikes and killing at least 11 people, activists said.

KALAK, Iraq — Adding to the gloom descending on Iraq, the New York Times reported Wednesday that Sunni ultra-fundamentalists responsible for the slaughter of at least 700 Shiites over the weekend, had fought off government troops backed by helicopters to capture the country’s largest refinery at Beiji on Wednesday.

DAMASCUS, Syria — Waving photos of President Bashar Assad and dancing with flags, tens of thousands of Syrians pledged renewed allegiance to President Bashar Assad as they voted Tuesday in a presidential election that excluded a vast swath of the prewar population and was decried by the opposition as a charade.

YARZE, Lebanon — Hundreds of Syrians desperate to vote for President Bashar Assad tried to rush their embassy near Beirut on Wednesday, scuffling with Lebanese troops using batons and sticks to beat them back as voting abroad started ahead of next week's national election.

HOMS, Syria — Hundreds of Syrians, some snapping photographs with their cellphones, wandered down paths carved out of rubble in the old quarters of Homs on Friday, getting their first glimpse of the horrendous destruction that two years of fighting inflicted on rebel-held parts of the city.